Collections Management

Collections Management is the overarching theme relating to the areas of specialisation pertaining to the care and preservation of the City of Townsville Art Collection and the Art In Public Spaces Collection to ensure that these cultural assets are maintained in perpetuity for current and future generations. Areas of specialisation include cataloguing, conservation, storage, preservation, presentation, acquisition and accessibility. As growing cultural assets of the Townsville community the aim of the Collections Management theme is to ensure that the City of Townsville Art Collection and Art In Public Spaces Collection are managed in accordance with established international and national standards for museums and galleries.

In the period 2012/13, one of Gallery Services’ major project was the development of a framework for a City of Townsville Art Collection: Digitisation Project, which was subsequently endorsed by Townsville City Council.

The City of Townsville Art Collection is recognised as one of Australia’s finest regional collections of art showcasing the cultural development and diversity of “art of North Queensland” and the Townsville region. The Collection presently holds 2700 works of art comprised of works on paper, paintings, sculpture, ceramics, photomedia/film, textiles, jewellery, artists’ books and mixed media.

The significance of digitising this Collection cannot be understated, and its successful realisation of the will provide a number of profound benefits for Townsville City Council, Gallery Services and the Townsville community. Benefits identified include - but are not limited to:

• Unprecedented access to the City of Townsville Art Collection for the regions’ community, students, visitors and key stakeholders

• Unprecedented access to the City of Townsville Art Collection to industry colleagues, organisations, institutions, governmental bodies world-wide

• Fosters promotion and enhancement of the City of Townsville Art Collection as a cultural asset of the region to world-wide audiences

• Provides a platform that fosters and promotes the development of local, regional, national and international collaborative projects involving the City of Townsville Art Collection that are presently unrealised

• Provides a platform through which artists of north Queensland held in the City of Townsville Art Collection are able to promote and further develop their arts practice

• Provides an opportunity for Gallery Services to exceed current industry trends and benchmarks in the delivery of core service objectives involving collections management; exhibition management and delivery; public programs and educative delivery; print and digital media publication management and delivery; audience development and engagement; and multimedia management and development.

• Fosters staff development and skills enhancement through ongoing training and implementation of industry leading service level delivery

• Recognition and promotion of significant cultural gifts made to the Townsville community and Townsville City Council by local and national art collectors and artists

Collections Management

Improvements to systems and procedures relating to preservation matting, preservation framing, and high quality image capture and reproduction have also been implemented. These across-the-board improvements will have a long-lasting impact on the successful management of the City of Townsville Art Collection, but most immediately the effects of these improvements can be seen in the quality of exhibition presentation.

A fine example of these improvements was the major exhibition

Hypercathexis, a survey exhibition of prints by Queensland artist Carolyn Dodds. The exhibition, curated by Sue Forster, the Editor of IMPRINT, the Print Council of Australia’s quarterly magazine, featured relief and intaglio prints and artist books spanning some forty years, and paid tribute to the artist’s inventiveness, masterly drawing and compositional skills, and dedication to the art and craft of printmaking.

Hypercathexis was widely applauded by visitors for not only the quality of the artist’s work, but the refined aesthetic of the exhibition. This resulted from extensive work by Gallery Services staff that saw the cutting of specialised mats and framing of some 70 individual prints, all utilising archival standard materials. Upon the exhibition’s completion, these prints were returned to the artist in the mounts for her enduring benefit.

A total of 110 prints by the artist were also photographed to professional standards and edited in order to be utilised in the beautiful catalogue that accompanied the exhibition. These photographs were also provided to the artist for her future use, which could translate to greater ease in the artist marketing or selling her work.

A major difficulty faced by Gallery Services is the limited storage space available, and this difficulty is acutely felt in the area of Collection Storage. A significant milestone achieved in the 2012/13 financial year was the establishment of a 20-rack collection storage system in the Pinnacles Gallery back of house area, which will now be utilised to house the photographic subsection of the City of Townsville Art Collection

The establishment of this space alleviates art collection storage issues in the short term, and has also enabled the creative re-use of space across both Galleries. This has resulted in the establishment of a workshop, also in the Pinnacles Gallery back of house area, which will ease production of artwork mats, frames, and exhibition furniture, and in the future enable Gallery Services to offer on loan standard frmes for works on paper to community members when exhibiting at Gallery Services venues.

George GITTOES

Legless Bike Cambodia [detail] 1993

Oil on canvas

173 x 380cm

Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program 2013